Feel This
by LeaveMeHypnotized
Summary: Amelia needs help on a neurocase and invites Derek over, who finds it frankly annoying to see Addie with Sam and with her ex-husband in her house Addison isn't as together about all this as it might seem to him. *COMPLETE*
1. Chapter 1

After a long day in the OR Addison finally arrived at her house and smashed her bag on the kitchen table. Two dead babies were a lot for one day and now she was just tired and exhausted and not at all in the mood to visit Sam next door.

Amelia sat on the big couch and was watching a movie, but Addison didn't feel like joining her either, so she just murmured a quick "hi" and went upstairs, finding that someone was showering. She assumed that it was probably Sam, since the haze that was coming out from underneath the bathroom door was very familiar to her.

So much for her alone time. Well, she couldn't really blame him, he had no idea of the day she had had and probably just wanted to be with her and that was actually pretty sweet. She wondered how long he had already been showering, deciding that joining him would definitely cheer her up and opened the bathroom door.

"Oh Addie, I forgot to tell you..." Closing the door behind her, Addie cut Amelia's sentence in half.

"Hey stranger, mind if I join you...?" She said with a sexy voice and opened the misty glass door while taking off her clothes, only to scream and stand outside the bathroom again within the next few seconds.

"Amelia?" She yelled with a preferably intimidating voice, which caused Amelia to show up at the stairway again immediately. "What the hell..."

"Why, Addison I really tried to warn you..." Amelia tried to sound innocently, but couldn't help the grin that formed around her mouth.

"I need someone to help me with this complicated surgery I told you about and well...you're always telling me to reconnect with my brother..." She shrugged and smiled at Addie's disturbed look.

Addison sighed. "Well. At least I'm not tired any more..."

xxx

"Oh my God, Derek, I'm so so sorry!" Addison began when her ex-husband came downstairs and outside to the patio, looking all fresh and relaxed from the shower.

"I had no idea..."

"C'mon Addie, don't worry, we've both seen it before, right?" He grinned and she grinned back in surprise and for a moment that was all they did, before Amelia cleared her throat to break the awkwardness and to get rid of the pictures that were starting to form in her head.

"Hello-o, guys! Don't talk like that when I'm around, would you?"

Addison and Derek both flushed slightly, only just now recognizing what Amelia was talking about, and quickly searched for other spots to look at.

Amelia shook her head and chuckled in disbelief. She hadn't seen them together since the divorce and this was too funny. But as this incident earlier had really all been her fault, she decided to better leave them alone before they could blame her for anything.

"I think I'm gonna go and get some sleep. Good night, you guys!" She winked at Addie and hugged her brother and hoped that by tomorrow they could actually have a coversation.

"So hello, Addison." Derek sat down in the wooden chair where Amelia had sat a minute ago and smiled friendly at his ex-wife. They mailed each other from time to time, but it was almost a year ago, that they had really seen each other. She looked stunning, as always. Admitting that had nothing to do with their history or potential feelings he might still have for her, after all she was still the one person in this universe who could read right through him most of the time, it was simply a fact. Addison was beautiful.

"Hello." Addie smiled back and suddenly both of them started to laugh. All this was just so awkward.

"You should've seen your face!" Derek gasped and Addison stuck out her bottom lip.

"Don't laugh at me!"

It took them quite a time to catch their breaths again.

"So, who did you expect in your shower?" Derek asked raising one eyebrow curiosly.

Addie wasn't sure how to answer that. He obviously wouldn't freak out like Naomi and he had no right to judge her, but still...

However, given the fact that he might be around here for longer, she decided to just be honest with him.

"Actually...well, I'm with Sam now, Derek." She hated her voice for sounding so shyly and hoped Derek wouldn't notice. Hell, why was it still so important to her what he thought?

"Sam?" Derek cleared his throat and his voice was serious again. "Good for you, Addie. He's a great guy."

She smiled apologizingly without really knowing why she did that.

"Would it be okay for you, if I stayed here? I mean, Amelia obviously didn't tell you that I was coming and Sam lives next door, right? So...you know what, I'll just check in a hotel near the hospital and..."

"No, no Derek, it's fine. I mean, we are good, right? And your sister lives here and if it gets too crowded, I can still move in with Sam for a few days..."

"You sure?"

"Absolutely."

"Okay!" He gave her the smile she had missed for so long. Not the stupid McDreamy-smile that made every stupid intern at SGH blush, but the Derek-smile. He had always been just Derek for her and he always would be.

"Thank you for having me, Adds. Us, actually. I bet Amelia has never thanked you for letting her live here..."

"Don't worry, it's really no big deal. And Amelia is great."

Derek nodded. His sisters had always loved Addie and, honestly, if they had to pick sides they would probably even choose her. Maybe that was the reason, why she was still more a part of the family than Meredith, despite his mother's best efforts.

They sat outside a while longer, without saying anything, just looking at each other, both of them lost in thoughts and memories and finally went to bed, as this got too hurtful.

xxx

The next day began with Addison waking up and asking herself if Derek was really there or if it had just been a part of the very weird dream she had just had. But then again her dreams usually didn't include him anymore.

She got up and ready for another day full of hysterical mothers-to-be. Not that she didn't like that, but she was more in the mood to cut today. She mostly didn't like days without any surgeries.

She went downstairs finding that the house was empty, Amelia and Derek probably already in the OR. The only hint of other life in this house was a single cup left on the counter in the kitchen. Amelia was usually buying coffee-to-go on her way to work, so she assumed that it was Derek's and the fact that it was only half empty made her smile. Flashback. She had usually drunk the rest of it before hurrying to work herself, only that it had never made her smile before. Not being able to have breakfast or any other meal together had been pretty depressing after a while.

For a moment she hesitated whether to drink the rest or not, finally pouring it into the kitchen sink. Stupid old habits, they were divorced, for God's sake!

"Morning, Beautiful!" Sam had opened his window next door and furrowed when he saw the slightly confused expression on Addison's face.

"What's the matter?"

"Nothing...How long until your first patient?"

"I have to leave in 20 minutes..." He answered, looking at her thoughtfully, still wondering what was going on.

"Good. I need to have sex with you right now!"


	2. Chapter 2

Sam had to go directly to the hospital to see a patient, but gave Addison a ride and dropped her at the practise building. It had been a wonderful morning for him and the great sex a few minutes ago had relaxed him entirely, yet it didn't seem to have the same effect on Addie. She was still lost in thoughts and he had given up to ask her for an explanation. Maybe she had just a weird day and if it was something serious, she would come around sooner or later.

Addison felt Sam's questioning gaze on her, but it didn't feel right to tell him the reason for her weird behaviour just now. The spontaneous morning sex...he could get it wrong if she told him that Derek was living at her house since yesterday.

Besides she didn't even want to behave weird. And _that_ was the problem here!

Getting out of the car she kissed him on the cheek and inhaled the semi-fresh city air to clear her head, before she headed into the building.

"Nae, I have to talk to..." She began only just now noticing that she really shouldn't talk to her about this. Usually she would, but Naomi was incredibly sensitive when it came to anything that could remotely include Sam and she couldn't blame her. If it was vice versa, Addison would be too. And then again she was back at thinking of him, ugh!

"Never mind..." She stopped herself and left a confused Naomi behind her as she walked straight into her office.

xxx

Around lunchtime Sam peeked into her office.

"Hey! Guess who is in LA these days..." He began excitedly until he noticed the not so very surprised expression on her face.

"Wait. How do _you_ know? I just met him in the scrubroom of St. Ambrose, no way that..."

"He is staying at my house." Addison interrupted him and looked as if he had just caught her doing something really, really bad.

"Well, o-okay." Sam was even more surprised now and honestly didn't know what else to respond to that.

"Amelia asked him to come to help her with that difficult neurocase and invited him to stay with us during that time. He came yesterday."

"Why didn't you tell me? I would've come over to chat with you guys..." Sam didn't seem to be concerned at all. Well, of course, that was just like him. He loved her and he trusted her and he had certainly missed his friend, too. Addison started to wonder, if she was really the only one, who was not supercomfi about all this.

"It was kind of late and I was surprised myself. Amelia didn't tell me that he was coming."

She shrugged while staring at her computer.

"Well, I guess he's gonna stay a couple of days anyway, so...Addison?" She seemed not to be paying attention at all.

"Huh?...Oh, I'm sorry, Sam, it's just this...case I have..."

"Okay, I better leave you alone." He smiled at her lovingly. "Don't work too much, babe. See you later!" He winked at her and left.

Addison sighed and kept following the bouncing screensaver bubbles with her eyes for a while. Then she cleared her throat to get back to life and went in the hall to look for the next patient.

xxx

Derek came _home _exhausted.

He was the first one, Amelia had to see a patient at the practise and had given him her keys to Addison's house.

The fact that Addison wasn't there either made him feel slightly uncomfortable, although it was easy for him to get around in the house. He had already noticed yesterday that her way of putting things in a certain order hadn't changed that much.

Also there was this familiar scent all around, just slightly different from the one that had filled their house in New York. Just missing his aftershave. He smiled at this discovery, but that smile faded quickly as his thoughts went further.

He could see why Amelia stayed here instead of buying an apartment of her own. She loved Addie more than anything else, he knew that. Sometimes it had seriously annoyed him having her around so much in the Brownstone, especially when he and Addie had had a day off and wanted to do what couples do, without a teenage sister in the house.

Well, now looking back that seemed ridiculous. Now he was living with Meredith and a bunch of her friends, who he wasn't even close with. He had never thought that he would end up like this.

Then suddenly a smiling Sam knocked against the glassy backdoor. Derek was half glad to see him. The other half...well, he didn't really know what is was.

"Hey, man! Are you all alone in the big house?"

"Looks like it..."

Sam laughed and they hugged mateyly.

"Yeah, Addie was pretty busy at work. Want a beer?" Sam asked and walked over to Addison's fridge without waiting for an answer.

"Who's busy?" Addison, who had just arrived, peeked around the corner and smiled at both of them, Amelia standing behind her.

"Hey, babe!" Sam went directly to her and kissed her and Amelia walked over to her brother to tell him, that their patient's lab results were good for now.

However, Derek couldn't really manage to focus on what his sister was telling him. Not only that he had never seen Addison with a real boyfriend before (except back in medschool with this rich guy Bizzy wanted her to be with and that didn't count as _real_). He felt like in a bad dream, where he had to watch his life from the outside, as if Sam had switched roles with him. Well, actually he had.

"Hello? Derek, can I talk to you for a sec?" Amelia punched him in the side to get his attention and pulled him outside to the patio.

Sam was still in the kitchen preparing a salad and Addison just wanted to go outside with the dishes to get the table ready for dinner, but stopped as she saw Derek and Amelia and decided not interrupt a brother-sister conversation.

"Derek, what the hell is going on?" Amelia whispered incensed. "Did you even hear what I just told you about the patient?"

"What? Yes...No...ugh, I'm just tired..." He sighed and rubbed one hand over his face.

"No, Derek, you're not! Well, maybe you are...but that's not the point! The way you just _stared_ at Sam and Addison...let's just say: Nae does that, too!"

At this point Sam came with the salad bowl. "Ready?"

"Yeah, dude, that looks delicious!" Amelia loved Sam's food and added only for Derek to hear "I love you, but get it together!"


	3. Chapter 3

Dinner went surprisingly well.

Addison tried to avoid talking to much about old stories, for many reasons, and Derek got the hint and tried to ignore Sam's hand on his ex-wife's thy.

What they did was rather a chitchat than a lively conversation and it was better this way, although Derek and Addie had always pitied the little original smalltalk, that was so common on every Montgomery family event in Conneticut.

Sam's pager finally ended the round.

"Ugh, damn it! I'm sorry guys, it's an emergency...See you tomorrow!" He waved goodbye at Amelia and her brother and placed a quick kiss on Addison's hair - Derek was reminded immediately of how good her shimmery auburn strands felt on the lips or between one's fingers...

Amelia kicked him under the table.

"You're doing it again!" She wispered and shook her head intimidatingly, which caused Derek to very unduly roll his eyes.

"What?" Addison was smiling at them, wondering what she had missed.

"Nothing..." Derek said quickly, glancing at Amelia, before he fully devoted himself to Addie again. "C'mon, I'll help you with the dishes."

"Why, that's nice, you hardly ever did that when we were married..." She raised one eyebrow, smirking teasingly.

"That's because we hardly ever had dinner together when we were married." He teased back.

"Ugh, true..." She sighed and grabbed the plates to carry them into the kitchen, when the phone started to ring.

"Amelia, that's for you!" She infered without even having to check that first.

"Ugh, no, I'm not gonna answer that..." Amelia murmured and her face darkened immediately.

"Yes, you are. Or you Derek, but I will definitely not talk to your mother and lie for you _again_."

Mrs Shepherd called quite frequently, which normally left Amelia begging Addison to answer and tell her that her daughter was busy at the hospital or something else, that made it impossible to call her back too soon. Mrs Shepherd was intimidating, Addison got that and felt a certain amount of sympathy for Amelia, but she had her limits and after all this really shouldn't be _her_ problem anymore.

Derek poked his sister, who sighed and got up to get the phone, leaving her brother laughing at her behaviour.

"Does she call often?" Derek asked Addison amused, as they watched, how reluctantly Amelia reached for the phone.

"Quite frequently..." Addison stated and turned around to put the dirty plates into the dishwasher, while Amelia was going upstairs to converse with her mother for the next two hours, because she wouldn't be able to choke her off one second earlier, honest.

"So dinner was nice, huh?" Derek broke the silence, that had once again started to feel awkward.

Any other person probably wouldn't have noticed the slightly ironic undertone of what he had just said, but Addison always got him. That was both, the curse and the blessing of their relationship, this connection that had been there from the very fist time he had looked into her eyes. The only other person, who shared a similar bond with him, was Mark.

They started to laugh, repeating all the weird smalltalk topics that had filled their evening, until Addison was almost hanging over the counter, gasping for air, and Derek's stomach was almost hurting too much to let out one more laughter.

"At least Sam's salad was good..." She managed to say, still trying to catch her breath.

"Did you love him back then?" Suddenly this question, that had rolled around in his head all evening, slipped his lips and was floating in the room, just like that.

"What?" Addison looked at him, confused, whether she had understood him properly, and without any hint of a smile any more.

Now that he had stupidly said it, he could as well just spit it out once again, he couldn't really take it back anyway.

"Back in medschool...did you already love him then? I mean, if I hadn't asked you out first, would you have..."

"Derek!" She interrupted him harshly. She hadn't seen _that_ coming. Nae's reaction, okay, that was between Sam and Nae, but Derek? Why would he even...?

"First of all: _You_ didn't ask me out first, Derek. Sam did. And I said _no_! Partly because of Nae, who already had a major crush on him and for the most part, because _I _had a major crush on _you_, even though it took you ages to ask me out, remember?" She paused to take a deep breath and continued, as Derek opened his mouth in the attempt to respond something.

"No, I'm not finished, Derek! Because, _how can you even ask me something like that?_" Her voice was even sharper than before.

"You _broke_ me, Derek! Over and over again! And I keep blaming _myself _for_ everything_, wondering, what I could've done differently to stop things from going so entirely wrong with us. The truth is, you didn't care. At all. Not in New York, not in Seattle. You have no idea, how much I have given up to save our marriage and still, I keep blaming myself. Now, do you _really_ think, I would've taken all that shit, if I had secretly wished to be with _Sam_?"

She sounded furiously, but the only thing her eyes revealed was hurt. It hurt her, that he would even think something like that.

He swallowed hard. It killed him, how desperately she was looking at him right now and in how much pain she obviously was. Despite however happy he might have seemed with Meredith, he knew how she felt. But he had never told her that.

Addison took another deep breath and went on, her voice calmer this time.

"Believe me, it took me a hell of a lot time to get over all this. And I'm sorry if you have a problem with that or if it hurts you, that I'm with _Sam_ of all guys, but...at this point it's me who really doesn't care any more."

She poured the wine that was left in her glass down the sink.

"Good night."

Without looking at him again, she went upstairs, tumbled onto her bed and just stared at the ceiling for a few minutes.

She really wished she wouldn't care any more.


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: **Hey guys! I just wanted to thank you for the awesome reviews, they are truly motivating:) This chapter might be a bit cheesy, but anyway...enjoy and tell me what you think;)

* * *

Addison had only moved a few inches, now lying curled up on her bed, the room was dark and it was getting cold to lie _on_ the blanket, but then again, she didn't really care.

She tried to calm herself down, but it didn't work, of course not.

All these feelings and the pain she had burried so deep, that she hadn't even known herself, they still existed, all this had suddenly been so present again, just because Derek had asked a simple question. Not even a new one.

It had seemed so ridiculous when Nae had accused her of the same thing, that she hadn't thought about it twice.

Still, _Derek_ questioning their relationship from the very beginning...that was a like slap into her face.

Yes, they had failed, epically failed even, were living more than 1.000 miles apart from each other most of the time and obviously started to fight, whenever they were together for longer than 12 hours...

But before all that, they had been _Addison and Derek._ This was one of the few things in her life, that she knew, had been true.

And no matter how much they fought, no matter how much Derek hated her for sleeping with his best friend or how little he thought of her because of that...until today she had always been sure, that he knew that, too.

xxx

"Hey, what are you still doing here?"

Amelia was just coming downstairs, after she had almost fallen asleep over her mother's lectures through the phone, finding her brother leaning against the counter in the kitchen. He looked as if his head was about to burst from way too much thinking.

"What's that supposed to mean?" He looked at her tiredly, wondering if she had heard the "conversation" before and was now asking him, why he wasn't staying in some smelly hotelroom, _or_ if she was just surprised that he wasn't sleeping already.

"Why? Do you think there is a second meaning hidden between the lines of my very words?" Amelia raised her eyebrows dramatically and then chuckled to herself about how incredibly funny she was. She just nailed it. Every time.

Derek rolled his eyes. She really needed to grow up. Still, he was relieved, that she had obviously no idea, what she had missed, or else she would have probably already kicked him out by herself.

"Forget it. Good night!" He placed a brotherly kiss on her hair, which was as dark and wavy as his, and left the room.

"Hey! Forget what? You are a very strange person, Derek..." His sister called after him, slowly shaking her head.

Well, now that she had quoted Addison, he felt so much better. Not!

xxx

Addison couldn't help it, the knot in her throat seemed to grow constantly and even though her WASPy tear ducts did ther best, her eyes felt slightly watery. This wasn't just about the evening, it couldn't be. She was exhausted. The whole week had been a disaster and now she couldn't even sleep, because...something about her ex-husband drove her crazy...

Suddenly someone knocked against the door and entered her room shortly after, without waiting for her to say something.

Derek recognized that curled up pose he found her in. Usually Bizzy had caused it or once even Richard, when he had told her to save a patient, that would've died anyway to teach her how to keep emotional distance.

She didn't allow herself to cry very often, he knew that and it had always broken his heart to watch her fighting it. It still did, actually. This was Addie's hurting pose.

"Addison? Do you...want me to go?" He whispered carefully.

She sobbed accidentally and he could only imagine how much she hated herself for letting him hear that.

When Meredith cried about something - for the most nonrelevant reasons that was and it happened quite often - he wasn't so comforting any more. As much as he loved her, she was a real crybaby and damn, that got on his nerves sometimes. The only good thing about living in a house with a bunch of other people, that only his post-it wife really knew, was that there was always someone else to look after selfsame post-it wife.

Now, seeing Addison struggling with her Forbes-side was a whole different thing. She was _so_ strong, that it had intimidated him time and time again, how much she could actually bear. Sometimes he had even been thankful, when he had been able pull the protective husband she usually didn't need.

So when he went over to her bed and lay down next to her, facing her back, it was just some kind of reflex, that he carefully wrapped his arm around her waist to calm her.

"Derek, please don't..." She whispered weakly.

"Sorry." He whispered back and drew his arm away quickly.

"_I'm_ sorry. I don't know what's wrong with me, this week has just been..." Her voice cracked.

"No" He whispered smoothly "_I _am sorry. You hear me?"

Silence.

"Okay." She sniffed and reached for his arm, putting it around her waist again.

She didn't care, whether that was a such good idea or not. They were friends for God's sake, at least kind of, and yes, they had a backstory, but friends could comfort each other. Nothing wrong with that.

Derek smiled shyly even though she couldn't see it. Then he shivered slightly, her hands were incedibly cold. She shivered too, because that's what people do when other people cuddled up behind them shiver.

"Sorry..." Derek murmered.

He tried to stroke along her side, to help her getting warm, but reached out a little too high and accidentally touched her breast. Perfect.

"Oh. Sorry!" He hurried to say and for a moment it was dead silent again. Then he felt Addison chuckling under his arm.

"Okay, maybe you should just stop apologizing for now..." She whispered with a witty undertone.

"Kinda weakens the meaning, you know..."

Then they both had to laugh, not entirely loosely and not without a certain bitterness, but that was not the point.


	5. Chapter 5

Derek was woken up by sunrays floating into Addison's bedroom. He blinked because of the sudden light and wondered what time it was. He hadn't even noticed that he had fallen asleep.

A blanket was wrapped around him, but there was no sign of auburn hair next to him. Addison must have had already got up earlier, which by the way reminded him, that he had still no clue what time it was.

He sat up in his ex-wife's bed, rubbed with his hands over his face to clear his mind and checked his watch. _10 a.m._?

How did that happen?

He was usually a very light sleeper and slept hardly for longer than 5 hours at a stretch. Maybe it was the ocean in Addie's backyard that made him feel so balanced and secure.

Or it was her...

_What_? No. The ocean, it was definitely the ocean!

He was lucky that he had no surgeries scheduled for the day.

It was too risky to operate on Amelia's patient two days in a row and they had decided to wait as long as possible, before getting him in the O.R. again.

Derek took a shower, put on some fresh clothes and went downstairs to see, what he could eat for breakfast.

He was alone in the house again, but he had figured that before. It was a normal weekday and if he had been in Seattle right now, he would have probably just finished his first surgery out of five. Why would things be different around here?

When he opened Addison's fridge, he was...well, _shocked_.

Addison had never been into cooking and neither had he. Well, he knew how to prepare trouts, but that was about it. Back in New York they had mostly ordered in or eaten at the hospital.

But here was the thing: Addie's fridge looked as if a chef had moved in. Suddenly Derek wasn't that hungry any more. Dude, Sam was really pushing it.

xxx

Addison was standing in the O.R., performing surgery at her best, like always. She had started hours ago, but she didn't care. Cutting made the rest of the world fade away, almost like a drug. She didn't feel hunger, thirst or anything else, didn't really think of anything else than what was lying on the table right in front of her. The highest level of concentration, that pervaded her body with adrenaline and only slowly abated after she was done, leaving her in a high, when she had been able to save a human life.

Every now and then, information from the outside seeped into her world: medical stuff like a dropping bloodpressure, she had usually already noticed herself, or seemingly random information like a nurse reminding her to eat a banana after three hours. The only persons who could fully reach her during that time were consulting surgeons.

Or, well, there was someone else. Addison could have sworn that she had just felt a certain tinkling as if someone was looking at her. She frowned, because it was ridiculous, yet looking up to be able to confirm that it was in deed _ridiculous_.

It was not. She found this familiar pair of eyes immediately in the crowd and couldn't help but smile in surprise.

Back in medschool, during their internship and residency she and Derek had always tried their best to watch each other's surgeries. As friends and lovers moral support had been more than important and as surgeons they had grown with each other.

However, somewhere along the way and due to their own success and carreers they had lost it, like everything else. In the end it had been mostly her who had watched him, not the other way around.

She wondered what he was thinking watching her right now. Anyway, it was nice.

Derek grinned as he noticed the surprise in her eyes. He wasn't used to having spare time and had choosen to do one of the things he had enjoyed most as a young doctor: Watching Addison cut.

She had always been elegant and incredibly powerful in the O.R., even as an intern she had had some kind of special aura in there, at least that had been his impression.

Now, ever since she had become an attending, the O.R. was hers, she literally owned it. Sometimes that was the reason he had a hard time working or operating with her. She was brilliant, of course, didn't really make _any_ bad calls, but that could drive _him_, as a fellow god in the O.R., nuts.

Still watching her now made him proud of the both of them and how far they had come – at least as surgeons.

xxx

Addison walked out high. Mother and fetus had made it for now.

She didn't even change before looking for Derek and noticing that, made her blush a little as she found him. He had just checked on Amelia's patient. Randomly, because he couldn't do much for him before the second surgery anyways, but he felt the need to look a bit busy and professional himself now.

"Hey!" Addison smiled at him in a very contagious way.

"You were brilliant in there." Derek said straight away. He looked into her still very surprised and questioning eyes a little too long and somehow it started to hurt him that she was so surprised. Had he really been _that_ inattentive towards her?

"Why, thank you...Derek." She seemed really dazzled. "It's just...you know...I know, I _am_ amazing..." She grinned. "But...I think this is the first time that youhave ever told me that."

Obviously he had.

Addison's smile was fading away as she saw the painful expression on Derek's face. _Wow_. Such a stupid word, but it was all she could think at that moment. They really weren't past this.

She reached out, carefully stroking his shoulder.

"Hey, it's alright. I didn't mean it like that."

What was she even doing? Of course she meant it! She would have never thought that she would have to comfort him on the day, when he would finally - once and for all - fully get her point. And it honestly hadn't even been her intention any more to make him get it. Yesterday's speech had been revealing enough.

So it was better to just close this wound again.

"C'mon, you wanna eat creepy hospital food with me?"

She smiled at him encouragingly and was incredibly proud of herself. She had really grown up.

_Or_ she still cared too much about him to unnecessarily put him through all this again. Yeah, not so proud any more.

xxx

Lunch was nice and for once they could talk like they used to before without things getting too awkward.

Derek was stunned by Addie's togetherness.

She had obviously moved on and maybe Sam was the better guy, he had to admit it, even though it was nagging him like hell.

"How is Meredith by the way?"

"Who?" Addie's question totally startled him out of his thoughts. It was one of these moments when you had actually understood the question, but asked again anyway. Just that in his case this was pretty embarrassing.

Derek blushed and Addison choked on a piece of carrot.

"She's fine, you know." He hurried to say, as if nothing had happened. But Addie was already smirking widely and burst into laughter.

He rolled his eyes and laughed with her. "You're such a tease, you know that, right?"

"I'm brilliant, you said that yourself." She winked at him in a friendly way and wondered if she could ask him about Mark.

"Mark's fine, too."

He grinned, when he saw that he had got it right. "I think, he misses you sometimes. No other attending wants to sleep wit him." Now he was the one teasing and she rolled her eyes. "But I miss you too. Not often, but sometimes..." He winked at her.

"You do, huh?" She winked back and smiled teasingly. Then her pager went off.

"Oh, shizz! Sorry, I have to get back to the practise. Miracle of life...See you at home?"

"Sure!"

She got up and hurried in the direction of the parking lot, wearing her _badass doctor face _asDerek and Mark used to call it. Her mind was elsewhere. _Had Derek Christopher Shepherd just flirted with her?_

Derek watched her go. The doctor face was priceless and...god, he had just flirted with her...but honestly, _she had flirted back_!


	6. Chapter 6

**A/N:**

Hey guys!

I'm so sorry, that it took me so long to update, but I've been pretty busy in the real world. Hope you understand that:)

Again, thank you all so much for the reviews! It means a lot to me that you take your time to wirte what you think:)

AmyHale: I definitely thought about the Nae/Derek talk and now in fact it's in this chapter :D maybe there is something to follow, not sure yet...

deslil: I don't see Addie cheating on Sam (at least not without a reason...). For now, he is a safe place for her. Of course, there's something building up between her and Derek and she doesn't really know, how to handle that. But given their past, she doesn't really want to allow herself to fully trust him again too soon, even if that is hard. He was the one person who knew everything about her and he broke her heart in a way, only someone who knows everything about you can. Strong feelings are a high risk factor for hurt. And then there is Meredith...

Anyway, enjoy and tell me what you think!

* * *

Derek stayed in the cafeteria for a while. He didn't really know what else to do. All his friends were working and he wasn't keen on standing in the way. Besides, all the other people working at the practise knew probably more about him than vice versa. Not that he suspected Addison of anything, but _Naomi_ was a pretty chatty person.

Finally he decided to give Meredith a call, not because he wanted to, but he felt that she might get it wrong if he didn't. He had called her once shortly after his arrival and so it was about time.

"Derek?"

"Hey, Mer...how are you?"

"It's about time you call..." Her voice sounded angry.

"Yeah, I know, busy day..." Thank god, that she couldn't see him sitting bored in the cafeteria right now.

"Well, you know, my days aren't all that relaxed either, but I still have time to think of you..."

He could only imagine her accusing face and sighed.

"Sorry, Meredith, really...but seriously, how is it going?" His voice was as encouraging as possible.

"Ugh, you know what, if you really care about things like that then just call earlier next time! See you in a few."

She hung up. Typically. But he was sure that she would call him back later, when the moody 12-year-old in her had shut up and she would feel sorry for what she had said. It went like this too often to _not_ foresee it. Her moodswings had used to make him chuckle to himself about her inner youth, but after three years they were just plain annoying.

He sighed again and decided to go home. He felt useless anyway.

xxx

Addie came home earlier this evening and brought Naomi with her. He hadn't seen her since his arrival and it was nice to see her now. They hugged.

"Great to see you, Derek! How are you?"

"I'm fine, Nae, thanks. Great to see you, too. You look great!"

"Well, thank you. _You_ look incredibly tired..." Nae had always been so motherly.

"Don't worry, Nae, he's just bored by the day."

That was Addison. She smiled teasingly at her ex-husband before hurrying upstairs to change her dress for something more comfortable. She still knew him all too well. He grinned back and turned to Nae again only to see that Sam was entering the house behind her.

"Hey, guys!"

Derek's stomach started to itch. Terrible. How could he have such hostile feelings towards a person, that was actually one of his closest friends? Watching Sam going upstairs to check on Addie didn't make it any better. Derek tried not to watch the clock in the kitchen, calculating what Sam could possibly do with her in every minute that went by. Naomi looked at her friend slighty bemused and finally grapped his shoulder.

"Come on, why don't we prep the table?"

xxx

Another smalltalk dinner went by and Addison was beginning to feel guilty about it. After all _she_ had brought her friends in this awkward position. Five years ago none of them, including her, could have imagined how things would change between all of them. It wasn't entirely her fault, of course, but she tended to see it that way.

After three hours it was slowly getting cold outside and she got up to clear the table from the dishes and get some blankets and more wine.

When she reached out for Derek's plate, their hands touched for the hint of a moment and it was nothing special, if one didn't know about the conversation they had had earlier.

Addison cleared her throat. This was definitely becoming to get too much for her.

"Sam? Can you help me with these please?"

"Of course, babe. I'll take them, just get the blankets out here soon."

If he could just stop calling her "babe". This thought occupied three persons' minds immediately. But Sam had obviously no clue, how uncomfortable he made his friends. While going inside he wrapped one arm around Addie's waist to slightly turn and kiss her.

Nae was looking to the ground, a defense mechanism she had developed to protect herself from too much pain everytime she was around them.

Derek on the other hand wanted to feel the pain, because it made him feel something he had desperately searched for when Addison had been in Seattle with him.

"Are you sleeping with her?" He turned his head to the left and looked into a pair of dark eyes. He hadn't even noticed that Nae had been watching him.

"What? No..._no_! Nae..." He chuckled nervously. "Why would you think that?"

Nae stared at him critically, finally putting one hand on his shoulder again, motherly as always.

"Look. I know, how you feel..."

"Do you? Because, really, it's no big deal..."

"Of course it is, Derek. We were both married to one of them for more than ten years. They have known each other as long as they've known us. You should have seen me, when Addie told me, that she was sleeping with my ex-husband..."

Derek fringed a little, when she said that.

"I was...furious. And heartbroken."

She swallowed hard.

"But now...I have decided to let it go, you know...just let them do, whatever they want. What difference would it make to fret about it? It would only make _my_ life worse and I really don't need that right now." She faked a smile, her voice sounding as if she was rather talking to herself than to him.

"It is a big deal, but that is perfectly normal. No need to worry about it."

Derek looked to the ground for a moment, then turned his head to Nae again.

"Thank you, Nae." He softly squeezed her hand.

xxx

Naomi left soon, because Dink was alone with Olivia that night and she wanted to check on him. She could never let it go, really. Sam decided to come with her to make sure she wouldn't check on her son-in-law too hard, because he knew that she could never let it go.

While Addison was taking a shower, since she had gotten incredibly cold outside, Derek thought that it would be better to stay downstairs until she was finished.

He thought about the things Nae had said earlier.

She was probably right. Only, the thing was, that he had moved on, was married again, while Nae hadn't really had something serious from what he had heard. If _she_ was jealous or hurt, that was perfectly fine. Yet again, _he_ had no right to claim somebody, whom he had literally thrown away without thinking twice, no matter if Addison had forgiven him or not.

Derek sank into the big couch, rummaging in the newspaper stand beneath it, until he found a specific medical journal.

He smiled.

Addie's favourite.

He and Mark had always made fun of it, because it was very Gyno-centric, until he had finally looked into it, finding that there was a lot of useful information, especially for men. By now he was almost 100% certain, that Mark had subscribed to this journal too. Addison's specialty had improved the skills of both of them, that was for sure.

"Still searching for ways to make her even happier?"

Derek winced and his ex-wife raised one eyebrow, smirking in a way, that made him blush.

"I..."

"Hey. I think that is very exemplary."

Now he grinned back. But she meant it, he could tell that.

Her hair was still wet and was lying over her right shoulder, leaving a wet spot on her shirt.

Her scent filled the room.

That usually happens, when people are just coming out of the shower, but it was actually giving him a hard time to think. It was so familiar and he could almost feel her soft skin under his hands, his lips...

He took a deep breath, which didn't really help given this particular situation.

"Where is Amelia by the way?" His sister was the only thing he could come up with.

"She is with Eric, I think. Dr Rodriguez." Addison chuckled. "You should be proud of her, he's insanely hot. What a cliche, right?" She shook her head, without ever looking away from him.

They heard each other talk, yet the words didn't really matter.

They had done this before, in fact it was a typical _Derekand Addison_-y thing to do, to fade out the world surrounding them, as if they could stop it for a while if they wanted to. As if the two of them were the only ones that mattered. Almost like in the OR.

Neither of them could stop it or wanted to stop it – until Derek's mobile went off.

Meredith.

He was almost ashamed to pick up, not because whatever it was, that he did here with his ex-wife, was clearly wrong, but because Meredith had disturbed their moment.

He gave Addison an aplogizing look and she smiled understandingly, mouthed "good night" to him, before getting up, slighty touching his shoulder and going upstairs.

"Derek, I'm sorry, if you are sorry too."

He sighed.

"Well, Mer, I told you that I was sorry before..." He couldn't help but sound a little annoyed.

"Okay, that's okay then. So...tell me about your day? What has kept you so busy?"

Now, how exactly should he answer to that?


	7. Chapter 7

So sorry that it took me so long to update...again:S Ugh, I suck.

However, I really love that you all seem so excited about this story=) Makes my writer-heart beat faster;)

I know, Sam and Mer are annoying, in fact they are supposed to be annoying, they annoy me all the time!:) But I will hopefully come up with a solution soon...

What also annoys me is what's going on at PP on tv right now!:( Actually I wanted to finish this story before things go down like that and influence me too much, but now...I think this story is going to be a lot more canon than I wanted it to be...

Decide for yourself whether this is good or bad.

It just so happened that there is a lot of Nae in this chapter...but I have my reasons:)

Enjoy and review, please:)

* * *

"Morning!" Derek walked through the glassy backdoor to the patio, where Addison was sitting with a cup of coffee and an untouched bagel that looked, well, old.

"Hey, roomie!" She smiled at him and folded the newspaper so that Derek wouldn't feel unwelcome.

He laughed, sat down on one of the wooden chairs and playfully knocked with one finger against the bagel, creating a hollow sound.

"You really want to eat that?"

"Not so sure yet." She grinned.

"Excuse me for saying this, but with all the fresh stuff in your fridge I assumed that you would have changed your eating habits a little." He raised his eyebrows and she grinned even more.

"Yeah, well, just because my boyfriend is suprisingly great with food doesn't mean that _I_ am."

In Derek's head the word _boyfriend_ seemed to be a hundred times louder than everything else, she had just said, but he did his best not to let it show.

"I could make pancakes..."

"_What_?" She laughed. "No, Derek, please...just...don't."

"Hey, I'm being serious here." But he laughed with her, of course. It was too hard to resist her laugh.

"Okay, seriously. I know, _I_'m the one who gave your sister salmonella, but come on. We both know you would have done the same, if you had been the one cooking..." She raised one eyebrow.

"And no, even if we _had_ trouts here, I wouldn't want to eat that for breakfast..."

He smirked and gave in.

"Alright. Let's go somewhere for breakfast then. I'm sure, you know a touristy place with a cute little viewfinder to look all over Malibu."

Now he got to her, he could see that in her eyes. What did she think, that he had forgotten all these things?

She was obviously evaluating pros and cons in her head and unintentionally biting down on her lip. Even if she said no now, this would have been enough for Derek to keep trying. _Trying_? What did that even mean?

"But I have to be at the practise in an hour. Is that okay with you?"

He smiled happily. "Let's go then!"

xxx

After breakfast they arrived at the practise together, because Derek wanted to talk to Amelia about their patient.

Sam was the first one to recognize it and wanted to go straight to his _girlfriend, _but was stopped by his ex. Standing right next to him, Naomi grabbed his arm.

"What?" He turned around wondering what she wanted, smiling and friendly as always. If someone was Mr. Niceguy around here, it was definitely him.

"Just wait a moment and take a look, Sam..." Nae was pointing her head in the direction of Addison and Derek walking towards Addie's office and obviously sharing some funny thoughts.

Sam gave Naomi a very confused look, still not getting what she was aiming at.

She sighed.

"Isn't that a familiar picture? Maybe a little too familiar?"

"I really don't know, what you are talking about, Nae..." He took a deep breath.

"Look, if this is about the kiss after Bizzy's funeral...I feel like I really gave it a chance, you know. You were the one, who didn't want to act on it..."

"Sam, just because nothing happened between us doesn't mean, that nothing will happen between the two of them...I'm just trying to tell you to be careful, alright?"

She kissed him on the cheek and walked to her office.

She felt as if she had broken his heart more than enough for a lifetime and didn't want to watch Addison do the same thing.

Of course, she had wanted to act on that kiss, that nostalgic moment when her best friend had still been in Conneticut, but things were difficult. Starting over again wasn't the smartest thought considering that she was about to move to New York to support her daughter at university. And apart from that, she didn't intend on doing the same thing she had always been judging Addie for.

xxx

As soon as she arrived at the practise Amelia peeked into Addison's office finding her brother and his ex-wife sitting on the couch, drinking coffee and laughing. A surprising picture, for sure.

"Hey!"

Derek and Addie looked up, expectant.

"Don't you have any patients...?" Amelia raised one eyebrow at Addison, teasing because in fact she loved to see her with her brother like that.

"It turns out that my patient is still busy talking to Violet..." Addie shrugged.

"How's our patient?" Derek asked his sister, not quite sure what he wanted to hear.

If the patient was stable enough for the second surgery he would finally have something to do again. Yet it would also mean that he wouldn't be needed around here much longer and keeping this in mind he had mixed feelings about the whole thing.

"He is ready and I have booked the OR for tomorrow. Is that okay with you?"

Derek caught himslef glancing at Addison, as if waiting for her approval or for a reason why this was too soon, but all she did was looking very intensely into her mug.

What did he expect?

He took a deep breath. "Sure."

"Alright then. See you later!" Amelia smiled and headed to the kitchen, only to turn around and peek into Addie's office once again.

"Your patient is ready."

"Oh, alright. Thanks Amelia..."

Derek stood up and soflty nugded his shoulder against Addie's.

"See you later. And be nice to your patients!"

She grinned and rolled her eyes.

"I'm always nice to my patients..."

"Oh really? What about the guy who wanted that his wife..."

"Okay, just go!" Addison laughed and pushed him out of her office, closing the door behind him. She could see him grinning through the glass and shook her head.

"Besides, the wife was my patient, not the stupid guy..." She murmured to herself.

xxx

"Look, I know, I am your friend and you probably don't want me to say things like this, but...Sam and Addison seem to be really good for each other."

Violet turned her head away from Addison's office to carefully gaze at Naomi next to her.

Their next patients came later, so they had observed Addison with hers. A little creepy, yes, but honestly, whenever people didn't work and were bored they mostly watched the others in this practise.

Nae looked back and raised her eyebrows in the Nae-way, that made people feel guilty immediately, whether there was a reason for it or not.

"I-I don't know, it's just...look at her. She seems so...different...in a positive way."

Naomi swallowed and cuckled bitterly, which really disturbed Violet and she was shortly considering to run away as fast as she could.

"No, Vi, it's okay. I'm glad you can see that, too." Violet stared at her friend, simply confused and not knowing whether it was good or bad what just happened here.

Naomi continued very seriously, looking at Addie through the glass walls of her office again.

"It's just that it's not Sam, who does that to her."

"It...it's not?" Now Violet was entirely perplexed, looking back and forth between Addison working in her office and Nae staring at her.

"No, believe me, it's not."

Naomi cleared her throat and left for the kitchen where Cooper, Charlotte and Sheldon had just arrived.

Violet watched her go, gazed back at Addison and sighed. Why was it, that she always felt as if she didn't have a clue on anything that went on in this practise?

xxx

"Addison?"

Naomi rushed into her friend's office as soon as her last patient for the day had left and shut the door very loudly behind her.

Addison looked up from her desk wondering in what mood Nae was lately. She didn't bother to say anything. The way that woman was looking at her right now told her, that she wouldn't let her speak anyway.

"What the hell is going on with you?"

"What? Nae, I don..."

Nae interrupted her right there.

"You're falling for your ex-husband!"

"I'm not. I'm falling for _your_ ex-husband."

Addison smiled carefully, to see if Naomi was able to laugh about that and to just let the topic go.

She was not.

"Addison, seriously. I swear, if you gonna do that to Sam, we will be over, once and for all."

"Do what exactly?"

Naomi laughed sarcastically.

"Oh, come on! It's _you_ we are talking about..."

Addison's face turned cold and Naomi could see that she had gone too far.

"Get out."

"I'm sorry Addie, but..." Her voice was softer now.

"Sam might not see what's happening here, but _I_ do. Do you think, I don't know what it's like? I have a _daughter_ with Sam and..."

"Just get out, okay?" Addie's voice was pretty much emotionless and Nae finally sighed and did as she was told.

When Nae had disappeared on the floor, Addison leaned back in her chair and took a deep breath.

They couldn't go on like this, even if Derek was probably leaving within the next 48 hours. She stood up, grabbed a few files, her bag and her keys and left for Sam's house.


	8. Chapter 8

Hey everyone!

I know, it has been quite a while...sorry about that!

Let me just say, I had a really hard time trying to figure out _how_ I want to continue with this story. I really don't know what to think about PP right now, it just confuses me. I mean, why, WHY can't Addisam break up already?

And then I was kind of down, because the musical episode was not at all satisfying as a "crossover"...:S Hmm...yeah, no good times in Shondaland lately.

Anyhoo, I can't thank you all enough for reviewing, I'm superflattered=)

This chapter has a little cliffhanger:O

Enjoy and tell me what you think or expect...;)

* * *

"Hey, babe!" Sam looked up from his saladbowl as Addie came through the backdoor.

"I haven't really seen you all day." He stood up to kiss her, but she just ignored his intention, smashed her bag on the counter and took a deep breath.

"Please don't call me _babe_, Sam, would you? I'm not your property..."

"Okay..." Man, someone had a moody day.

"Remember when I told you, that Eric Rodriguez was flirting with me all the time?" She looked at him pretty impatiently, which confused him because he really didn't know, what she was aiming at.

"Yes...?"

"I did that because Nae was pressuring me. I know, she's my best friend and your ex-wife and I feel terrible to tell you that, but...could you just talk to her about it? I mean, this is you and me, right? I love her, but she really needs to stop _protecting_ you from me." She looked at Sam a little desperately and even more when he didn't answer, but just kept staring at her.

"Sam. You trust me, right? I am not that kind of person any more and, come on, why the hell would she think that I want to sleep with _Derek_ of all guys?"

Sam was still staring at her and his brain was working as rapidly as possible at this time of the day.

He swallowed hard.

Of course, this was not about Addison and Derek, it was about him and Naomi. But if he told Addie the truth, it wouldn't be very relieving.

So, what was more important to him, or better: who?

He knew the answer, he had always known the answer, but even thinking it made him feel like an incredible twat. He wasn't a bad person, at least he had used to be the good guy. The geek who wouldn't harm a fly, not to mention the two women he loved the most.

"_Sam_? Would you please anwer me?" Addie's voice was pitched in a way, that made him feel even more terrible.

She was his best friend, she deserved the truth. Plus, if she got to know all this, he could maybe convince Nae to give it another try...

He sighed.

"Addison, I...this is not about you and Derek."

"Yeah, I know, it's about me and you..."

"No." He interrupted her calmly. "It's about me and Naomi."

Addison looked at him questioning.

"I kissed her."

Finally, he had said it. What a relief, he hated to keep secrets like this one. Yet the fact that she was so silent now, scared him.

Sometimes it is too hard to endure silence, especially when you have caused it.

"It happened a while ago, when you were still in Con..."

Then again, _breaking_ the silence can make everything so much worse.

"When I was still in Conneticut?"

Addison wasn't stupid, in fact she was a freaking genius and she knew exactly what was going on.

When things had gotten hard with Naomi and Maya, he had wanted to be with her, because she had been easy and comforting. Lucky for him that she had been desperate enough not to see through his whole revenge-rebound-thing. She had opened up to him more than she would usually allow herself and now this was the result. Perfect.

Still, she was incredibly calm.

"So much for '_I will not hurt you_', right?" She grabbed her bag and turned around to leave, but Sam was faster and ran in her way.

"Addie, wait..." His eyes were as apologetic as he could manage, he wasn't great with facial expressions.

Now, _her_ eyes broke his heart. They were full of sadness and exhaustion.

He didn't even know, what to say, he couldn't make it better anyway. So he just let her go past him.

The fact that Addison, _Addison Adrienne Forbes Montgomery(!)_, didn't even bother to shout at him was revealing once more how broken she still was from all the things that had happened to her lately.

xxx

When Derek came home with Amelia, they found Addie on the couch. It was dark and they could hear her snuffling.

Derek looked at his sister and mouthed "Bizzy?". Amelia had told him that Addison had had a hard time dealing with her mother's death, but she had been okay about it for a while now.

Amelia shook her head slowly, trying think about something else. Then her eyes grew big and she took Derek's sleeve, pulling him into the hall again.

"Shit, I forgot to go to the meeting with Charlotte!"

"_WHAT_? What meeting and who the heck is Charlotte? God, _Amelia_, I thought for once you would actually know what's going on here..." He pointed his head in Addison's direction and rolled his eyes at his little sister.

"I'm sorry, but I have to go...You can handle that." She patted on his shoulder and left him completely confused.

He bit down on his lip and was happy that nobody could see him like this. Derek Christopher Shepherd, one of the best neurosergeons of the country, most definitely swamped and scared by a situation like this.

Thinking about it further, he silently sighed. He had used to be so good at calming Addison...

Okay, first thing he did, was making her tea. He remembered that her stomach was not that resistant to stress and it gave him more time to think about what to do next.

"Hey." He handed her the mug a few minutes later and she looked up, tired.

"Hey." She managed to smile slightly, taking the mug and moving over a little, so that he could sit down next to her. She was past being embarrassed about all the hankies around her and the red eyes. Hell, he had seen her worse.

They just stared at the expensive carpet for a while, before Derek cleared his throat.

"Wanna talk about it?"

That sounded somehow very stupid and mentally he shook his head about himself. He wasn't the talky kind when it came to problems, no one knew that better than her.

"There is nothing to talk about...other than I'm somehow just always people's second choice..."

He would've asked her what Sam had done, but he felt that it wasn't his place to get into this. So he just waited for her to continue.

"You know, you would think that I'm used to this by now, but...I'm not even crying because of him, it's just...it feels like someone wants to wreck me down really badly until...I don't know..." She laughed sarcastically and sipped on her tea.

"Okay, here is what I know: You have never been my second choice, Addie." He searched for eyecontact and stroked her back comfortingly.

She was about to tell him otherwise, because obviously he had thrown away their marriage for the perfect 12-year-old, but his gaze stopped her and he could feel her relax a little under his hand.

"Just take it like that, okay?"

His voice sounded so honest and it confused her. God, how much she had missed him. This warm part of him that had disappeared over time, at least towards her.

His rising God-complex had just erased it at some point and it had been so hard to remember this side of him, when he had constantly given her the feeling of being rivals rather than a team.

Although that had never changed her feelings for him.

"You know, the worst thing is that I cannot even blame Nae for what she did." She shook her head thoughtfully, while he was wondering what she was talking about. She just looked back at the carpet waiting for him to figure it out.

Then he got it and squeezed her shoulder. "Oh, Addie. I'm so sorry..."

He would have offered to punch Sam and lecture Nae on her double standard, but that would seem just ridiculous now, keeping in mind that he had never even punched Mark for sleeping with her.

She shrugged and tried to smile bravely, but was really fighting back the next wave of tears.

No matter what happened she always tried so hard to be brave and it always got under his skin.

This was definitely not the right time to set his repressed feelings free and an hour ago he had been sure that he could continue all the repressing for the next 48 hours until he would leave for Seattle again. But now...

He gently lifted up her chin and looked into her sad, broken and confused blue eyes, until he found a glimpse of what he was feeling in them, too.

Then he kissed her.

Just like that.


	9. Chapter 9

Hey!

First of all, I really don't know what to say...believe me I'm totally flattered that you all take your time to review my stories! And please know, that you can always be honest with me or make suggestions or anything. I'm very open to productive critique:)

AddekLover13: OMG, thank you so much! Your comment honestly blew me away:)...and made me feel so bad about late updating^^ So I know, it's been a while again, but I did update sooner than last time ;P

Mariella Montgomery: Thank you so much:) And you don't have to be sorry for saying that Sam is an ass. He totally is!

Now, this chapter...I really don't know whether I like it or not...please tell me how you decide:)

* * *

"_Alright everybody, listen up: I want you to work together in teams of three people each and to find out what killed your cadaver without catching it yourself! "_

_Dr. Winters laughed at himself, but obviously he was the only one. Ugh, he hated when students stopped worshipping his brilliant sense of humor._

"_Ha, nevermind. I feel like ladies versus gentlemen today, so, Shepherd, pick two people, Montgomery, pick two people, Adams..."_

_Mark moved automatically next to his best friend and Derek nodded towards Sam to make his team complete. _

"_Why the hell did he let you two pick a team and not me?" Mark mumbled a little offended and Addison laughed and patted his shoulder. _

"_Well, I think he only wanted the best to be leaders. Sorry, Mark..." She teased and winked at him and Derek before she walked over to Nae and Derek's sister Nancy._

"_We are gonna kill you." _

"_Yeah, don't be so sure about that!" Derek watched her go and grinned._

"_Okay, guys, whatever we do, we have to finish this before they do, alright?"_

"_Then we should better hope for a brain injury or something, or you won't be of much help..." Mark rolled his eyes. It was true, Derek was one of the best students, but he was already pretty focused on neuro even though they had years to go until they had to decide for a specialty. _

_Sam chuckled and Derek gave both of them a teasingly warning look. _

"_Don't forget who is the boss here. Besides, with Nancy in her team, Addie is doomed anyway..."_

"_Yeah, Nae hates these kinds of things too. She thinks medicine should help people, not molest them until after they're dead..." Sam added in a tone that made Mark chuckle. _

"_Don't go there, dude. If you talk like that about your girl, it will somehow on some way always get back to you..." _

_Derek snorted amused. "Yeah, Sam, you better listen to the expert. He has had a whole bunch of one-week-girlfriends in his life..."_

_Mark raised his eyebrows._

"_And what's so wrong with that? At least I have the guts to ask the girls I like out on a date instead of trying to beat them in medicine, knowing that this is most likely impossible anyway, and banning my best friend from doing so..."_

_Sam looked up at Mark in surprise. "You like Addison?" _

_Mark had just opened his mouth as Derek interupted him. "No he doesn't, he just wants to fuck her, because she is a hot redhead and he hasn't had that yet. Can we go back to our cadaver now?" He suddenly sounded very serious._

_Mark swallowed his growing anger about this. Derek had been his best friend for over a decade now, but he never failed to remind him, what role he had to play in their friendship. The stupid womanizer made the sensitive goldenboy look even better._

_On the other side of the room Addison had managed to divide the work so that everyone was okay with it. Nancy wasn't pleased to work with cadavers in general so she kept the record, while Nae and Addie where busy examining every organ of the dead body. Naomi sometimes had a hard time to arrange this kind of work with her beliefs, but after all she was learning how to save alive people by doing this._

_Addison was, well, in her element one could say. She had been visiting her father and his students at university pretty often as a kid and cadavers were nothing new to her. Plus, Derek was being arrogant in an annoying way, that however also attracted her. _

"_You two are such geeks." Nancy's voice reached to her and as she noticed, that she had been staring at Derek for what had probably been two minutes, Addison blushed._

_Nancy chuckled and nugded Nae's shoulder. "You know normal people like us have sex with their boyfriends..." _

"_Nancy!" Addison felt her cheeks getting even warmer. "And he is not my boyfriend..."_

"_Yeah, Addie, I'm sorry, but your point is invalid. You guys spend so much time together, that Mark is probably the only one who doesn't feel like an outsider sometimes. You know, I don't know that much about you, but I do know my brother quite well. And even Mom knows that he is crazy about you. He is just too shy to say something, because he has never met a girl that is as smart as he is, besides his sisters, of course." _

_Nancy grinned. _

"_So, what I'm trying to say here-"_

"_We're finished, Doc!" Julian Adams interrupted Nancy and everyone in the room turned towards his team's table._

"_I don't believe that..." Derek mumbled annoyed, wondering how that douchebag could ever even see the difference between frontal and temporal lope._

_Dr Winters looked at the record and findings of Adams' team and seemed very satisfied. _

"_Congrats, Adams! You and your team will be in the OR with me during my next surgery."_

_Addison shook her head. "Perfect."_

_xxx_

_Derek walked into the bar and joined the others at the counter. Everyone seemed quite normal. Mark was flirting with some random girl and Nae and Sam were giggling in a corner. Only Addison was sitting there rather depressed, sipping on a beer. _

"_Hey!"_

_She looked up. "Hey. Joining the dumbness that is this bar compared to the OR?"_

"_Yep. It's depressing, isn't it?" _

"_We should be in there right now."_

"_Hmm. Well, you wouldn't be there anyway, because my team would have won, you know?"_

_He smiled teasingly, but she was obviously not in the mood for that right now._

"_You're probably right. Your sister distracted me." _

"_Yeah, well, I knew you would be doomed with her in your team." He chuckled to himself ._

"_Can I ask you something?" She looked at him very seriously and he took a huge mouthful of beer. _

"_Yeah." _

_She inhaled deeply. "What are we doing, Derek?"_

_His heart missed a beat and he felt as if he couldn't breathe anymore. But he knew that this was his chance and he didn't want to ruin it._

_He took a deep breath._

"_Well, I don't know about you, but I'm going to kiss you now like a man."_

_Before Addison or anyone else could laugh about geeky shy medschool Derek telling the woman he loved something like that, he kissed her._

_Just like that._

_xxx_

It was a short kiss and slighty salty because of her tears. Still, it felt like all things do, that one had once loved and then just put aside. A piece of oneself. A piece of home.

Addison didn't pull back, but Derek wasn't sure if she kissed him back either. It was probably pretty puzzling for both of them.

Addison tried to breathe normally when their lips parted again, but Derek didn't notice her efforts since he was doing the same.

She looked him in the eyes and he could tell that kissing her really didn't help to make her feel less confused.

"Derek?"

"Hmm?"

"What are we doing?" Her voice was weak and shy and her gaze questioning.

In some way she had lost her ground ever since that one fateful night in New York, but there had been times when she had felt closer to finding her balance again than right now.

He just looked at her for a moment.

"Well, obviously I was not kissing you like a man..."

That made her laugh and, as mad as he still was about all the times people had made fun of him because of this sentence, he smiled, too.

"And I'm glad that you think _we_ are doing something, because a minute ago I was thinking that I was the only one being weird and kissing my ex-wife, because I can never see her cry..."

"Hmm." Addison smiled. "You really can't, can you?"

Derek blushed a little and she squeezed his knee.

"Look, obviously we're both pretty...I don't know...tired and exhausted and...stuck..."

She shrugged a little shyly.

"I mean, it felt good kissing you, but...we should probably not do that again."

Derek nodded thoughtfully without looking at her and Addison cleared her throat.

"So...good night then."

She stood up. "And thanks for the tea and…everything..." The last word was barely audible.

"Yeah. Good night."

Derek sighed. 48 hours.


	10. Chapter 10

I did it! Finally!

No big blah-blah this time, just thanks for your positive reactions on the flashback:)

Enjoy and please tell me what you think!

* * *

The next morning Derek and Amelia were already having breakfast when Addison came downstairs. When one had the time it was always more than necessary to have a healthy breakfast before standing in the OR for what could turn out to be a ten hour surgery.

Addison was still wearing the button down shirt she had slept in and, while Derek smiled because he remembered that she loved sleeping in these shirts, Amelia looked rather concerned.

"Aren't you going to work today?"

Derek gave his sister a disapproving look as Addison scuffed by. How nice to hear something like that first thing in the morning.

"I don't know. I feel sick." That wasn't even a lie. Work meant facing Sam and Naomi and feeling like a damn rebound fling, who had prevented a Bennett reunion for far too long, because she had been stupid enough to think that Sam was the one. Not the one one, but the one after Derek, who by the way was married to the one after her. That made her status very clear. And being alone made her feel sicker than anything else at the moment.

Amelia gave her an understanding look and Addison wondered if Derek had told her anything, deciding that he was too proud to join his gossiping sisters and Amelia too smart not to see the obvious. It had been quite rocky with Sam since Bizzy's funeral, no wonder she knew what was going on. At least half of it.

"Where's your appointment book? I'm gonna reschedule your patients."

"No, Amelia, I'm fine, you don't have to-"

"No, she's right." Derek gazed at her warmly. "You're exhausted, just take the day off."

Addison couldn't help but smile weakly at them and shake her head a little. The Shepherds. They had always been the better part of her family.

They grinned back and Amelia sighed. She had almost forgotten how good everything had been once upon a time...

"You know what? I've missed this!"

Addison and Derek looked at the ground immediately and Amelia wanted to punch herself. _Good Lord, filter!_

"Aaaall right...where did you say was your appointment book?" She smiled weirdly, trying to apologize with her face and was relieved as Addison pointed her head to the couch table.

Derek waited for his sister to go upstairs with the phone until he slightly touched Addie's hand to have her look at him.

"You okay?"

"I'm such a loser for staying here today." Her voice revealed her anger at herself.

"You could watch me operate. Us, I mean."

She just shrugged as an answer and took a sip of coffee. Derek grinned and she was just about to roll her eyes at whatever reason he had to make fun of her, as she noticed that her cup was still empty on the counter. The weird thing was that it somehow wasn't weird at all for either of them and she took another sip of his coffee, smiling.

Amelia came downstairs, tossed Derek his jacket and nodded towards Addie, telling her that everything was taken care of.

"Let's go and safe this guy once and for all! And you call me if something is wrong..."

She gave Addie an air kiss and headed towards the front door. Derek put on his jacket and nudged her shoulder.

"Come watch us later, all right?"

Addison smiled tiredly.

"Maybe."

He smirked and followed his sister out of the front door.

xxx

Derek noticed when Addison came into the gallery immediately. It was around lunchtime and they had been in the OR for three hours. The patient's status switched from stable to unstable almost continuously, it was nerve-racking and arduous and probably for nothing. Even if he survived the procedure there would be no guarantee for normal brain activity afterwards.

He could see that Addison saw that too when he looked up to meet her eyes. She had watched many surgeries like this one and far back when they had started on solo surgeries she had even done some with him even though she had never really liked anything neuro related.

xxx

"_Derek, come on, I hate neuroanatomy...can't we do something else?" Addison gave him a lusty grin, hope sparkling in her eyes. She knew she was hard to resist, but Derek knew how much it nagged her when he did, so he just grinned at her without any further reaction. _

"_It's not that difficult-"_

"_I'm not saying that it is difficult, I just know that I will never become a neurosurgeon and that I would rather spend my energy on something else right now..." She pouted._

"_How can you know that?"_

"_Well, my libido is telling me." Another lusty gaze._

_He rolled his smiling eyes and shook his head a little. "I mean that you don't want to go into neuro." _

"_I know that you mean that..." Her voice was just a whisper, but when he just continued to stare at her expectantly she gave up, picked up her pencil again and concentrated on Woolsley's Brain Atlas in front of her._

"_Archer wants into neuro. When I would join him there it would be the start of an endless competition between us and I don't want that, because I do know that he's more important to me than a medical field. Besides, I don't want all these hopeless cases, that stay hopeless even after the surgery. I want to change people's lives more effectively, make families and watch tiny humans leave hospitals with an entire healthy life waiting for them because of me." _

_Derek looked at her proudly, even though he couldn't fully retrace her opinion. _

"_What?" _

"_Nothing...I think we're gonna be great surgeons...and I love you." He was suddenly flooded with excitement for the future and knew at this exact moment that he regretted nothing, not a single decision he had made so far, because who knows if he had ever met her then. Addison._

_She smiled in surprise and raised one eyebrow. "I know. Both of it."_

_He shut the tome in front of her, smirking. "Let's take a break from this..."_

xxx

How things had changed since then. How idealistic he had been. He shook his head and looked at his sister, who had the same sobered expression on her face.

"Go and talk to the family. I don't think we should continue, but it's their decision. I'll keep an eye on him."

Amelia nodded and pulled off her bloody hygienic gloves before leaving the OR.

Derek look up, meeting Addison's eyes again. He had never thought that the consequences of being a doctor were even beyond the immediate hurt of losing patients. He had so much more regrets now.

xxx

"Do you think he will wake up?" Standing next to Amelia, Addison looked into the patient's room, where a sobbing wife was holding her husband's lifeless hand. Two kids were with her, the older one crying the other one too young to understand how close it was to becoming a half-orphan.

Amelia forced herself to turn away from this heartbreaking scene and sighed.

"Even when he does wake up he will not be the man she wants any more."

Addison hugged her and looked over to Derek who sat on the other side of the floor, fumbling with his scrubcap in his hands. He had come here not able to fix anything and it was more than obvious how he felt about that. Now there was no reason for him to stay.

He stood up. "I need a drink."

Addison looked at Amelia, who just shook her head. "I'm all right. Go, get drunk, I'll stay here in case something changes..."

"Amelia, nothing is going to-"

"Shh, let her stay if she wants to." Addison grabbed Derek's arm and pushed him towards the changing room, before squeezing Amelia's hand.

"We don't have to get a drink, we could just go home..."

"Thank you, but this really is about the patient. I'll stay." Amelia smiled weakly and swallowed hard as she heard an especially loud sob from the wife inside the room, that made the younger kid finally cry too.

xxx

It had become late afternoon or early evening depending on the point of view, not really too early for a drink, but not late enough to feel perfectly okay with getting drunk.

The bar was surprisingly well attended and Addison sat with Derek at a two person corner table. She hadn't been here in a while. Formerly the whole practice used to come here together having a drink after work, but things had changed a lot since then. They had become older and settled. Plus, they weren't really a team any more, personal conflicts had effected the whole practice and driven them apart. And it had been an eternity since she had been with Derek in a bar, the last time when he had saved her brother's life.

"So, happy to get back to Seattle?" She didn't really know what else to say and drinking in silence was sad and unhealthy.

He shrugged and cleared his throat. "Honestly, I don't really know..."

She reached for his hand. "Hey, come on. You did your best, Amelia knows that. And I do too, if that makes any difference." She gave him a warm look, one of the kind he had given her this morning. But then she felt like she was gazing at him a little too long and withdrew her hand from his quickly.

"Remember the patient after Archer? The pregnant woman who had run over her husband with the car?" Derek's eyes met hers slowly and she just nodded. Not a very good memory.

"You were right. I should have let you take the baby out."

"I know." She didn't say that gloatingly. It was just a fact. He had made a bad call back then. That happens. And they both knew it. Still her answer made him smile a bit. Is was just such an Addison-y answer.

"I got really wasted after that case." His smile faded again. "And not just because of the patient...And Mark...I didn't just punch him because he is sleeping with Meredith's sister..."

Silence.

"I know."


	11. Chapter 11

**A/N:** So... It's been a while, I know and I'm deeply sorry. But here is the new chapter (finally!) and it's the longest one yet. This story is coming to an end soon (there's gonna be one more chapter and an epilogue) so enjoy! Please review and let me know if you're still reading:)

* * *

Derek wasn't even that surprised about her answer. He had seen her face after that fight, when he had wiped the blood off his nose...

He felt the alcohol running down his throat, leaving a sharp and tickling path behind. He wasn't drunk, he knew that, but he also knew that without the drinks in front of them they would never have this kind of conversation. Maybe they should just go.

She cleared her throat. "We should go." She didn't meet his eyes and he smiled. People who think alike have a special kind of connection. They didn't lose it. Rolling her eyes at his inexplicable smiling, she stood up and sat down right afterwards. Everything was spinning. Her ex-husband's smile grew even wider. It wasn't spiteful, which was his luck, really, because then she would have probably slapped him. No, it was painfully warm and reminded her of a similar occasion. Yeah, at times he used to be a good husband. She pouted.

"Stop looking at me like that, I'm not drunk." She couldn't be, right? Her WASPy liver was used to so much worse... Thinking about it further she knew that the amount of alcohol in her body was met by a non existent amount of food and _that_ was the problem. She hadn't eaten since breakfast.

"_You_ are drunk enough for a moody police officer. I'm gonna drive." He reached out his hand and waited for her to give him the keys.

"Oh, come on, Derek, you cannot drive either..." She raised an eyebrow at the empty glasses that covered most of their table. Her voice was louder than usual, a sure sign of the state she was undeniably in. Derek grinned. "Okay then, let's just walk. It's just along the beach, right?"

Addison stared at him in total disbelief. "What?" Her dismay was interrupted by a pair of drunk laughters. "I don't know, Derek, I've never _walked_ that way." Simultaneously a part of her – a part that apparently no quality or quantity of alcohol could ever fog – was begging for him to stop already. To stop with all the things that caused her mind to go all the way back to when her life had been simple.

_In New York people walk._

Derek gazed into those eyes he once had been able to read at a glimpse and thought that seven years ago she would have linked her fingers with his and they would have walked home holding hands, creating the shadow of _one_ person in the lights of New York's street lamps. Her condition would have allowed him to grab her hand now, but he knew it would be far beyond the line. They had crossed to many lines already.

She stumbled towards him, fumbling in her purse before shooting him an annoyed glance when he told her that it was on him. Still, as soon as they got out of the outdoor table chaos in front of the bar, where the actual fresh air reached them quickly, he wasn't that superior any more. Yeah, fresh air can do that to you, at least in the glorious combination with alcohol. Now the world was spinning for both of them.

xxx

Mitch, who had forgotten his last name a few months ago – crystal itself or better in the glorious combination with alcohol (again) can do that to you – was just about to close his eyes for a few hours before his most hated kind of turkey would hit him again and he would have to do things for a new dose that made him love his amnesia, because it prevented him from remembering his shame.

He had positioned himself next to the most promising garbage can in the still quite warm sand. The sea bridge above him shielded him from wind and rain and honestly, what more could he have asked for? However, as always in these short moments when you are completely fine with yourself and your life, something he hadn't thought of before disrupted him harshly.

People.

Of course, he was at the beach and that could happen, but given this rather unattractive part of the beach with its sharp and stony sand, when it happened, the troublemakers were mostly others like him, who would stop their noisiness as soon as they would realize that someone wanted his peace here. But the people walking by now, and Mitch could tell that at first sight, were not at all like him and only interested in themselves. He sighed and opened his eyes to see if they were matching his imagination. And, oh wonder, of course they did.

A couple, way too old for the behaviour they evinced, was rather staggering than walking by, which in itself explained the fact why the noise wouldn't pass by and leave him be. The woman's hair was shimmering reddish in the moonlight and even though Mitch's eyes had also suffered under his addiction problem and even though he actually wasn't into women at all, he could tell that her hair was not the only beautiful thing about her. He felt like the guy next to her couldn't quite compete – well, maybe his hair, but that was it then. They seemed to laugh and fight at the same time, which caused Mitch to fully come to the conclusion that they were probably drunk. Not that alcohol would have that effect on him any more, but everyone started out like this. He chuckled to himself for no reason and closed his eyes again, not knowing that these two people were his last chance to stay on the planet.

xxx

"Stop it!" Addison tried to hit Derek with her purse, but only created a funny air-sound with it. "This is _not_ funny. I've no idea, _no_ _i-dea_, where we are. At all." She hated that her foggy mind was making her laugh, when she meant it so dead serious.

Derek let himself drop into the sand and took a deep breath. Being drunk always made him tired. "I'm sorry, seriously. I thought it would be nearer to your house." He repressed a giggle and then a yawn and she sighed before dropping into the sand next to him. "This sand doesn't even remotely look like mine..."

It took a while before Derek's laughter over this got weaker. When he was able to catch his breath again, Addison had already shoved what seemed like half the beach over him. He patted his jeans to wipe the scratchy sand away. "We could call someone."

Addison snorted. "And then what? It's not like we can describe _someone_ where to find us..."

"Well, let's see. We just passed by a sea bridge, the sand is quite nasty compared to _yours –_ and there is the polar star, so we have to be -"

"Oh, shut up, Derek, that didn't impress me 15 years ago and it won't now. It was Mark's compass that good us out of the woods, not your pseudo-astronomy!"

"Well, but if Mark hadn't had the compass, then -" Her expression made him stop with a faint grin. Her amusement was obviously starting to fade. He ran his fingers through his hair, as always when he was trying to think, yet only finding that his hair was full of sand.

"You will miss your flight," she said factually, without revealing how she felt about that in any way.

"I'm sorry." He was. Seriously.

"About missing the flight? Don't apologize to _me_ for that." She raised an eyebrow and he looked away.

"Can I ask you something?" Her voice had a certain pitch, soft but somehow also leery, that made him wait for _honey_ at the end. She used to do that so often. Call him that when something followed that he might've not liked. He didn't answer, but she continued anyway. He'd thought so.

"What's up with you and Meredith? I mean, you know, I just – remember the two of you so _close_." She repressed a sigh after that word, naturally. "Did something... happen?"

"You want to talk about me and Meredith?" Now it was his turn to raise an eyebrow.

"No. I want to talk about you, Derek. I know you. At least I used to, but that's not the point actually -"

"I got shot," he interrupted her, staring at the ocean. So silent, and dark like ink. Then he looked at her. Her uncharacteristically messy hair, drunk messy and windy messy, but still beautiful. Her eyes that were searching for something she used to take for granted with him. Her nose that was a little red, a sure sign that she was freezing with the sun long gone. Her lips that began to form a sympathetic and apologizing expression, because he took so long to continue.

"I got shot and Meredith lost a baby because of it-" She wanted to interrupt, probably say how sorry she was, that she didn't know about the baby and so on, all these things that people interrupt other people for when they start speeches like that, but he didn't let her, "but all I really cared about was, what I would be in your story if I died."

Now it seemed like she was trying to evaluate the amount of alcohol still left in his blood. He swallowed hard.

"If I would be the guy you were married to once, who got shot, and that would be all you would tell a guy you would then be spending the rest of your life with. You know, lying in a hospital bed with a stitched heart that you know from experience is likely gonna stop beating no matter how successful the surgery was – that makes you think." He chuckled a little, very lightly, but it was somehow also scary to hear. Addison knew for a fact that there had been a time in his life when he had thought a lot about dying and his own death. After his father had died, practically all through high school and college.

_Until I met you._

He had told her that once. Only once, because it was done then and the good time started, the time when they were invincible. All five of them. Naomi, Sam, Mark, Addison and Derek. Group IV with Mr Mulligan.

_We are deeply thankful for your selflessness and your contribution to our scientific education. May you rest in peace._

"You know, I always pictured my funeral with lilies, because I know you love orchids and lilies and we had orchids at our wedding. I was always sure that I would die before you, because you listen more to your body than I do, you live healthier, and because you would take it better than I would. When I had died, when that guy had murdered me like the guys back then murdered my father, I would have had no idea of my funeral. I don't know what flowers Meredith would have chosen or if she could've handled choosing anything at all."

"You don't even give a damn about flowers, Derek," she whispered and nudged his shoulder softly without looking at him, just trying to get him out of that mood. Her finger drawing patterns in the cool sand underneath her.

"See, that's not the point, Addison!" his voice was suddenly very loud, very desperate and her eyes wandered up to his in surprise.

"Why did my life turn out so differently from what I wanted? I mean, when did we change? There was a time when we thought we could manage everything, have it all and forever! When did we stop fighting for that?"

"Derek, stop." _With the we and everything._

"I can't! I can't stop thinking about that since this damn bullet hit me. I thought being chief was worth all of it, but it was horrible!"

Then she started to laugh. Maybe because she was still more than a little drunk, maybe because he sounded so adorably indignant at how reality never meets one's expectations or maybe because it was better than to cry about the sad truth of his words. Probably because of a mixture of all these things.

"Why is that funny?"

"It's not – it's not – it's – very – very sad," she panted between laughters, holding her stomach, because it began to hurt really bad and Derek started to feel excluded, like when his sisters had occasionally laughed with Addison about something he didn't understand or even worse, when Mark and Addison had started to have insider jokes between just the two of them.

_Remember when we were at the beach that day and… Oh right, you were working._

She finally caught her breath, her eyes still swimming with tears. "I'm sorry, I am. I wish I had been there, when you were chief, I mean. Chief Shepherd," she chuckled, shaking her head. "You must have been every interns idol, hmm?"

"Oh come on, Addie, stop grinning like that."

"I can't," but she did in this exact moment, getting very serious. "If all this hadn't happened, if you hadn't been chief for a while, if nobody had shot you – you wouldn't be like this. You would still hate to be with me, because I cannot see you the way you want me to."

He was just staring at her for a moment, wondering if the water in her eyes was still from the laughing or a sign of something new.

"Addie -"

"Don't say that isn't true. Because you just told me yourself."

He cleared his throat. "Okay, well, I can't say whether it's true or not and neither can you. Because all of this _did_ happen. And I don't know what I would be doing right now, when Amelia hadn't called, but she did and now I'm here with you and all I wanna do is get drunk over wedding pictures, fall into bed and make you realize that you can't live without me." If he had been Mark he would've completed this with a perfect Sloanesk smirk, but like so often in his life – when it comes to women, when it comes to Addison – he had to face the painful truth that he is not. Years ago he would have comforted himself by saying that he knew Addison better. Now not even that was true any more.

He couldn't quite identify the way she was glancing at him, maybe something between nostalgia and sympathy in her eyes, her head tilted a little to the right.

"We're already drunk," she whispered, "and it's not like this line worked with you -"

"Shit!" Derek jumped to his feet in a second, looking at the person he just noticed a few meters away from them, searching for a motion. Addison wrinkled her nose, then turning around hastily to see what he was staring at so frantically.

His hand was already on the man's wrist, waiting for a pulse when Addison made it through the sand to the trashbin. She was jogging toward him and the slack figure beside him as quickly as possible considering the scratchy stones underneath her feet, the darkness and, well, she hadn't sobered up enough for her legs to run at full speed.

"I can barely feel his pulse. We need an ambulance," Derek demanded in his hospital voice, that she hated, at least outside the hospital like in the brownstone or the beachhouse or...

"Addison, did you hear me? We need an ambulance!"

She bowed down to him and the person next to him, probably a homeless guy; he smelled worse than the mixture of organic and plastic garbage in and around that bin.

"I'm aware, Derek, the problem is we still don't know where we are." Her eyes flew examiningly over the patient. She had seen a few of those in her life, their number increasing since she lived in LA. Her hands searched quickly in the pockets of his dirty jacket, finding a sooty pipe. "Crystal Meth," she concluded and whipped out her blackberry.

xxx

It's always remarkable how quick a doctor's body can break down alcohol in the case of an emergency. Almost as remarkable as the never changing favourite locations of certain subcultures. It had been easier to tell where they had been than she had imagined.

Amelia found her sitting tiredly in the hallway, surprise all over her face.

"Hey, why are you back here? And – oh my god, no offense, but you smell like, I don't know, something I never want to meet, I guess."

Addison smiled weakly. "None taken. We found an unconscious homeless guy at the beach."

"_We_? Derek is here again too? He will miss his flight." Amelia quirked an eyebrow.

"I know, Amy, I'll take the next one," Derek said rather annoyed, just coming out of the ER, shaking out his arms. Pumping the chest of an adult male no matter how skinny was not the easiest thing in the world. He and Addison had taken turns but an hour was still a lot.

"He will make it, but they know him already. Say he'll probably be back on the streets as soon as he can stand up again." His tone had a pitch that Amelia didn't like. It sounded as if he was judging her once again, as if she was a representative of all the drug addicts all over the planet. She decided to let it go, though. Both her brother and her ex-sister-in-law looked physically and emotionally exhausted.

"Come on, I'm gonna drive you home," she said, not unaware of a certain pride in her voice. Never in her life had she imagined to be in a situation where she would actually look better or more competent than the two of them.


	12. Chapter 12

**A/N: **Surprise! That was quick for my standarts wasn't it? Ha! Thank you for still reading this story and for the awesome reviews and enjoy!

* * *

They didn't have a chance to talk about the beach if they didn't want Amelia to interfere and Addison was glad about that. She wouldn't have known what to say and she was too tired to think about anything future-related. Or past-related.

What was it about this place anyway? First Mark, now Derek. Funny or not, this made her think about Sam. It was around three a.m. when she found herself standing on his deck, knocking against his glassy sliding back door. Amelia had already fallen into bed, she had a surgery scheduled in four hours, and Derek was showering. This would take longer, she assumed, the smell on her own clothes and body still creeping its way into her nose.

And then also into Sam's. "Addison? Do you know what time – oh god, what is this smell?" His sleepy eyes became even smaller as he wrinkled his nose in disgust.

"That's me actually. Can I come in?" She didn't know why, but she grinned.

He lifted an eyebrow, then shifted his body so that she could walk by.

"You weren't at work today," he said, sliding the door close again.

"I know."

"Listen, Addison, I – we – this – it can't go on like that. We have to be able to work together. I mean, when we started this, we knew about the risks and -"

"There is no _we_, Sam. And I sure as hell didn't start anything. _You_ were the one suddenly talking about med school again and how you had asked me out and I had said no; _I_ just thought we were friends. And yes, I was very aware that Naomi would be hurt even though it didn't matter to _you_ at that point, but I didn't know that you were planning on screwing her again, as soon as I would be out of town." She took a deep breath. It felt good to tell him all this.

"Are you finished?"

"Actually I could go on and on, because I'm really mad, _really_ mad, at my ex-boyfriend Sam, but that's not why I'm here. I need to talk to my friend Sam and I hope that's still possible, because I honestly miss him." To be fully honest, she'd been missing him ever since they got together. Back then she didn't know that friend Sam and boyfriend Sam were mutually exclusive; if she had, things would've gone differently.

He hesitated for a moment, surprised, then nodded. "Okay."

She smiled relieved and almost thanked him, stopping herself though. She had just told him that this wasn't all her fault, so she was better off practising what she preached.

"So, tell me about Naomi. What are you two planning to do now?"

He pursed his lips, leery. "Are you serious or is this just some kind of -"

"No, no, I am serious. I need – I really want to know."

"Okay, well, there is no plan. She doesn't want me. She wants to move to wherever Maya gets a college acceptance." He had forgotten about the colleges Maya had applied for, but whatever. Things like that had just always been in Nae's hand. "Without me," he added then, waiting for Addison to start gloating. She didn't.

"I'm sorry about that, Sam. I mean, as a friend. I really am." She shortly considered stroking his arm, but then remembered the smell and dismissed the thought. "Here is the thing. If Nae'd wanted to give you another chance, would you have taken it? Do you think you could still be good together, after everything that has happened? Don't you think that some day you would wake up confronting the same problems as before the divorce?"

His gaze was inexplicable and she couldn't quite say if he knew what she was talking about. He swallowed hard and cleared his throat. "I think that we will never know that now, because Nae doesn't want to take the risk."

She rolled her eyes at this, so typical for him to just blame the others, but let him continue.

"But, you know, Addison, all of us, we became who we are because of each other. And when Nae and I were married I felt like I didn't even know who I was without her. That's why I wanted the divorce, to do things on my own, have experiences of my own. And, after all, I still choose her. Not because we know each other and it's easy, and not because of Maya. But because I will never have again what I had with her. And I wish I had known that before. - No offense, though." He let out a dry chuckle.

"None taken," she said automatically, her eyes on the couch table without seeing it. Then she sighed as if to wake herself up from her thoughts and focused on him again. "Thank you, Sam. I gotta take a shower now."

With that she left him standing all confused in his living room. He drove a hand through imaginary hair on his head, realizing that he had applied too much of the moisturiser before as there was still a slight oily film on his baldness, and further realizing that now he couldn't even console himself with screwing the hot girl any more. Damn! He smashed a flat hand onto the marble top of his kitchen counter and went back to bed.

xxx

It was already dawn when she was finished and finally smelled good again, like her favourite 80$-body lotion, bittersweet somehow.

In the shower she had been dead tired, but now that was over too and so she sat down on the couch in the living room, legs wrapped into a blanket, sipping coffee and thinking instead of sleeping.

As always when you don't realize that you still fell asleep after all, it seemed like minutes later that Amelia came downstairs, squeezing her knee and smiling at her uncharacteristically small eyes.

"You have a very comfortable bed upstairs, you know. I tested it myself once when you weren't there."

"Wasn't – sleeping," she slurred as if she was drunk again, her voice hoarse. Then she managed to lift a disapproving eyebrow at the testing confession.

"Yes, you were," Amelia just ignored the eyebrow, "but anyway, I just wanted to tell you that I'm leaving for the hospital now and I didn't want to wake up Derek, because then he will probably be hungover and all kids of mean to me again, so... Just tell him goodbye from me when he leaves."

"You sure?"

"Absolutely."

Addison nodded, "Okay then," and watched her former sister-in-law leave the house. They were a pretty good team, the two of them... She sighed and pulled the blanket up over her head. Amelia wouldn't like what she was about to do, would she?

"Derek," she said about an hour later when she ran into him on her way to the bathroom, somewhat shocked that he was already up. She had to grin as she met his eyes though, hangover or generally bad night was written all over his face. Yet he still managed to smirk back.

"Very funny." His smirk faded quickly and she felt a knot build up in her stomach.

"Listen, we can forget about it if you want. You can just fly back and call me occasionally like before and we can just never ever talk about it again." They had always been good at not talking about certain things.

He looked at her for a moment, leaning there against the door frame in front of him. She used to do that, leaning against door frames, looking all devilish and sexy with dresses half open for him to zip up, giggling when he took them off completely instead and cautiously grinning when he rambled down an excuse why they weren't on time later. Now she looked defeated, as if someone had permanently stolen her high horse, and he knew it was at least partly his fault.

"I don't want that actually," he said finally and was surprised when it made things even worse and her eyes began to sparkle waterily.

"Hey," he made a quick step toward her and gently cupped her cheek almost not touching her skin. "You are my best friend, okay? I want you to know that, because I've refused to admit it to myself for far too long. And I'm sorry that I walked away and that I met Meredith and didn't fight for what we had..." His voice dropped and he cleared his throat. "I understand if you don't trust me any more, Addison, but I'm willing to trust you again."

He paused and now it was his heart that dropped as she didn't say anything. His eyes cast off from hers and he looked to the ceiling first, then to the ground. His hand fell to her shoulder.

"No matter what, I'm gonna break up with Meredith. She deserves someone who really gets her."

"I'm sorry, Derek."

He rose his eyes, surprised that she'd said something and then understanding what she'd said. He sighed only slightly, swallowing a knot in his throat, before forcing a warm smile and tucking a strand of perfectly smooth hair behind her ear.

"It's okay." He nodded slowly. "Will you drive me to the airport, though?"

An apologetic grin formed around her mouth. "My car is still at the bar, remember? But I will call you a cab and come with you, if you want." She shrugged, trying to create a casual mood, yet knowing that it had never worked with him.

He chuckled and was relieved that she was still in the mood to tease him. Things never changed _that_ much, did they? "I'd like that."

xxx

LAX was more than crowded around lunchtime, but then again, big airports are always more than crowded, even in the middle of the night. Derek didn't really enjoy flying in general or big airports for that matter. It was more a necessity, the fastest way to get from one place to another, than something he especially decided to do when travelling. If he had a choice he preferred roadtrips, that's why he'd bought the Jeep.

Addison on the other hand liked big airports and the feeling of freedom and connectivity they seemed to be radiating. That one could just buy a ticket and be somewhere else entirely within the next six to twelve hours. As a teenager she had often thought about fleeing to some place where nobody knew her or her family. Where she could be free. She had had the money, but Archer had been right when he'd said she hadn't had the guts to turn her back on Bizzy or the Captain and to fly to the Galapagos Islands or another of the few places her parents had absolutely no connection to, where they wouldn't be able to track her down immediately. In the end it had been the roadtrips with Derek in their med school years that gave her the feeling to be free from all Forbes Montgomery shebang for a while. But she never stopped loving airports.

She noticed the look on Derek's face though, while she thought about it, and remembered that he didn't.

"I could have arranged a private flight for you, you know."

He snorted and she chuckled, knowing who that reminded him of. "Sorry," she said. "I know, you're not Bizzy."

Thinking of her mother, her smile faded immediately. In a way she was free now, but it didn't make her happy. Of course not. Sometimes she wished she had never seen the softer side of her mother, something in the way she had looked at Susan, something that had never managed to cross her eyes when she had looked at her own children. It broke her heart to think about how empty her mother had probably felt in her WASPy world where she had never been able to live the life she'd wanted. At the same time she hated her for raising her and Archer in the same world with the same uptight values and completely ruining their lives too. Except that she wasn't dead yet. Her mother had killed only herself, not her, not Addison...

She felt a hand on her shoulder and looked up.

"I should go now." He gazed at her warmly and she thought that his eyes hadn't changed a bit. She could still imagine them squinting behind goggles.

"Thanks for – thanks for everything, Addison, really. Being here helped me figure out – a lot." He squeezed her hand longer than necessary, feeling a little melancholic, but then let it go and attempted to head towards the gate.

"Wait." It slipped out and she almost wasn't sure if she said it out loud until he turned around, eyes expectant but not hopeful. As if she was going to ask him to give back his old record of The Clash she'd still had and had given to him before they'd left the house.

"What?"

"I said _wait_, Derek." She smiled a bit shyly, yet noticing that she was glad it'd slipped out.

_Life is not an endless story and you can't erase the words that you've written, but you can always start a new chapter._ There was a postcard at the hospital gift shop that said something like this. She'd thought it unfitting in a hospital, it wasn't the patients' fault that they were sick, but Amelia had said it depends.

He stepped a little closer again and she cleared her throat. "I'm flying to the Hamptons in a month. You know, our house, my house, whatever. I know you hate it there, but -" she chuckled at his face. "Don't look at me like that." She tilted her chin a little higher, grinning. "I'd appreciate it if you'd come too."

He smiled his Derek-smile, but not in the usually so superior way. He was still too surprised for that. "You would appreciate that?"

She just nodded and then his eyes began to sparkle.

"I'm gonna be there," he whispered and she didn't understand a word because he was standing too far away and everything was loud around them, but she knew what he'd said. They didn't hug and they didn't kiss and nothing was final when he disappeared into the crowd heading to Seattle, but something very important had changed for both of them. They felt something nobody else could quite understand.

They'd become Addison and Derek again.


	13. Epilogue

She came to the big house at the beach on the other side of the continent four weeks later at dusk and just left her bag in the hall before she went outside, inhaling the cool evening air. East coast air. The air she grew up with. She never realized how much she'd missed it until she was here again.

Slipping out of her shoes, no high heels but still far too expensive for most people, she dug her toes in the fine sand, sensing it tickle her plantars and then also her arches and ankles. She walked down to where the waves of the ocean soaked the sand rhythmically, wincing a little when the colder-than-expected water first wetted her toes, then smiling when the wind blew her hair back and made her dress rustle between her knees.

After the divorce she'd never even for a minute considered to sell this place or put it up for rent. This was why. For her it had always been more than a status symbol and even all the memories, good and not so good, couldn't make her feel any different about it.

She didn't know how long she was standing there in the wind and the water, but when she turned around the bathroom light was gleaming in the dark. She sighed. He always had to shower after a flight before he was viable again.

"I didn't know you still had the keys," she said minutes later, entering the bathroom and unbuttoning her dress.

"I didn't know you still had the house," he countered with a smirk when she slipped through a misty glass door in front of him for the second time in recent history.

She nodded, letting him have this one, and hesitated for a moment, smile fading. "Are you sure we can be us again? After all this?"

He gazed at her warmly, reaching out to pull her under the hot stream of water with him. "No," he said watching her clear blue eyes searching his, "I think we can be better than us this time."

He stroked wet strands of auburn hair out of her face, his thumbs lightly brushing over her cheeks, and wasn't sure if there was a tear in her eye or if it was just a drop from the shower.

She wrapped her arms around his neck then, never breaking eye contact, and whispered, "I'm glad you came," before closing her eyes and pulling him into a kiss, that was both, exactly how he remembered it and somehow also very different.

* * *

**A/N: **So that was it. My first chapter fic. It feels really good to have it complete, but it also makes me kind of sad... Anyway, thank you all for reading and reviewing as much as you did, because I don't know if I would have kept writing without all the encouragement. It's not perfect, I know, but I like parts of it and if you stick around maybe the next ones will be better:) Oh and of course I would like to know your final opinion on this! Pretty please?:)

This story was named after the song "Feel This" by Bethany Joy Galeotti.


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